Many docs have kept mum on peer errors, incompetence: study

Nearly half of 1,662 physicians surveyed say they have declined to report incompetent behavior or medical errors by their peers, according to an article in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

The survey of primary-care and specialty physicians found that 45% werent always reporting impaired or incompetent colleagues in their practices, and 46% of physicians who knew of a serious medical error were not reporting the error at least once to authorities. The study was conducted by the Institute on Medicine as a Professions Survey on Medical Professionalism, and appears this week in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

This raises serious questions about the ability of the medical profession to regulate itself, said Eric Campbell, one of the lead authors of the study, who attended a news conference to release the survey, along with other researchers and members of the physician community.

Although nearly half dont report instances of incompetence or medical errors, nearly all of the physicians surveyed said that they believed such instances should be reported to the proper authorities. Some 93% thought physicians should report all significant medical errors to authorities, and 96% thought physicians should report all instances of impaired or incompetent colleagues to authorities. -- by Jennifer Lubell

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